A situation experienced by many driving adults has been the scenario where a driver parks a vehicle at a location, enters a store or mall, and subsequently can barely remember where the vehicle is parked. Also, parking a vehicle in a relatively empty lot, only to return to find the lot full of other vehicles, can result in substantial confusion as to where a driver parked.
A common solution to this problem is for a driver to press the “lock” button on a key fob, which results in the vehicle sounding a horn or alarm, or flashing lights, if the vehicle is close in proximity. If the vehicle is too far away, however, or if multiple users are simultaneously attempting to locate vehicles in this manner, this solution may not achieve the desired results.
Another attempted solution to this problem includes the vehicle reporting coordinates to a mobile device, once the vehicle is parked, and the mobile device user using the coordinates to find the vehicle. This may work well in certain scenarios, but if the phone is off when the vehicle is parked, or other communication errors ensue, the user may rely on this system only to discover that the coordinates were never logged.